Project Studies

Runout Modeling

Dr. John Allan was the first who identified and mapped the extent of the South Peak hazard. Based on his information, in 1934, the Government of Alberta issued a notice of danger to residents living in the danger zone.

Figure 27. Dr. Allan’s map of the south peak danger zone.

In 2000, BGC Engineering revisited Allan’s assumed failure mechanism and volume calculations. Using modern methods to determine rock fall and runout, BGC Engineering revised the danger zones. All of the current early warning and emergency response plans and protocols use the BGC Empirical Upper Limit Zone.

These simulations all showed South Peak failing as a single 5 million m3 mass. However, recent studies using LiDAR data indicate that a series of smaller volume failures is more likely to occur in the South Peak area. Therefore, we applied dynamic runout models to predict the runout areas for the unstable volumes identified. We have also analyzed the runout distances for the potential rock avalanches from Third Peak. More information on these new runout models will be published in 2016 in the annual Turtle Mountain Field Laboratory Data and Activity Summary.

Figure 29. Runout-modelling results for “shallow” rock failure at North Peak. Solid lines depict outline of runout based on 3D model analyses and dashed line depict outline of runout based on 2D analyses. Orange area delineates area of failure. Modified from Hungr, O. (2014): North Peak of Turtle Mountain, Frank Alberta: runout analysis of two potential landslides.